Quotes (1)

(Jim Hacker has just been given responsibility for local government.)Ludovic Kennedy: Are you saying that he [Jim's predecessor] failed?
Jim Hacker: Please, let me finish, because we must be absolutely clear about this, and I want to be quite frank with you, the plain fact of the matter is, that at the end of the day, it is the right, nay the duty, of the elected government in the House of Commons, to ensure that government policy, the policies on which we were elected, and for which we have a mandate, the policies, after all, for which the people voted, are the policies which finally, when the national cake has been divided up, and may I remind you we as a nation don't have unlimited wealth, and we can't pay ourselves more than we have earned, are the policies... I'm sorry, what was the question again?

Notes (1)

The aggressively left-wing and outspoken "Ben Stanley" is clearly a parody of one of Britain's best-known political figures of the era (and subsequently), Ken Livingstone. The latter was, as leader of the Greater London Council, a thorn in the side of the Thatcher government for many years and the object of much execration in the right-wing press. He was equally unpopular in the Labour Party, whose official line he often opposed; but he still became first directly-elected Mayor of London and held the post for many years.